Kaze
by MessengerOfDreams
Summary: In truth, we're all pretty depraved and insane but I'm easily the craziest of us all. Takes place before the events of Most Wanted


**Blacklist racers in Need For Speed have the potential to be unceasingly interesting if considered. Kaze is personally my favorite.**

**Takes place before the events of NFS:MW. Back then, none of the Razor crew topped the blacklist so I figured JV would naturally lead the board, and Mia Townsend would have spent some time posing as a street racer. Just more minor notes than anything.**

**Also I personally think the CLK-500 is the best pursuit car in the game.**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing, regret nothing and let them forget nothing.**

Nothing is quite as reassuring to me as the sound of my Mercedes. It's empowering when it tears through scaffolding and police SUVs, it's alluring when I burst through the country club highways at over 160mph, and it's comforting when I'm reminded that it's the one dependable thing in this playground we call Rockport.

That's all this is. Rockport, its streets, its oblivious, law abiding citizens (which there aren't many of), and the police who catch the rebellious, it's just a playground where we get in our colorful, pumped-up toy cars and disregard human life for a few addicting bursts of adrenaline and try to see who's the king of the hill. Street racing is a business trade and people make thousands, even millions, off of it. The city is constantly shifting even if structurally it remains the same. There is no underground as there is in Bayview; everyone is brazenly tearing up the city in broad daylight; uprooting street signs, blowing up gas stations and tossing around station wagons in our wake. In truth, we're all pretty depraved and insane but I'm easily the craziest of us all.

The adrenaline I get is as natural as breathing, to the point that as I find myself driving through Little Italy, having provoked a trail of (if I count right) twelve undercover Pontiacs courtesy of trespassing into heat level four, I find that it's more shallow of a thrill than it's ever been before.

This happens sometimes, more and more lately. I decide to motivate myself by spicing this chase up. I sideswipe a bit of mid-construction scaffolding to lose a couple of cops on my tail. A bit of satisfaction peaks through as I see reflected on my side window that the planks of wood have fallen atop two of the police cars, and one more pulls over to help. I reckon those three cops are another fifteen thousand to add to my bounty. If someone ever catches me and puts me away for good, they'd have enough to never work another day in their lives.

Of course, no one's ever caught me.

That kind of work is probably what boosted me up as far as number four on Rockport's Blacklist. As part of our quest to be the best kid on the playground, we keep track of ourselves in an 'elite group' (hah) called the Blacklist. If you want in, you challenge number fifteen and work your way up as far as you can go. That's how I did it, at least. I challenged the coattail rider at fifteen named Rog, a man who had the balls to act as if what we were doing was noble. The fact that the man was easily the most polite and helpful person in the street racing scene disgusted me more than it endeared me.

We are not nice people. We are not a noble society. We're criminals. Psychos. Selfish bastards and bitches who will break anyone to get our way into the scene. For Christ's sake, being the best depends on how many cops you can crush through destroyed chunks of city; how fast we can tear through suburban streets and college hallways to get to the finish line first; how much money we can earn by doing so. We exchange peace for chaos, calm for adrenaline, happiness for pride, stability for insanity.

I focus back on the road ahead of me, getting my head back in the game just in time to perform a couple of sharp turns to crash my way across busy Project Boulevard into the entrance to the emptied sewerbed; one of my favorite pursuit breakers in particular. There's no way I'll be able to lose all nine cars at once, but that's fine with me, because I'm not done playing with them yet.

The sirens are louder than the engine of my car and the police radio that each blacklist racer has earned the right to. I can't hear what plans they have to stop me next (especially troublesome if they want to set up a spike strip) so I guess I'm going in blind. I don't mind; I could use a challenge.

I find more scaffolding inside the sewer; giant metal beams at least thirty feet high. I knock them over and watch as the cars are shredded nearly in half. If none of them are injured, I would be surprised, but at the very least, I've shaken off four cars by the time I've broken out of the sewer on the west end by Highway 201. When I've set my wheels on the highway and begin to break into a sharp burst of speed, I am reminded that number five and I are meeting up around these parts to face off; her to take my spot, me to guard it.

Every single person I've beaten to make my way from a straggler to one of the elites (again, I scoff at this) wants to get back at me for passing them. People want my heads almost as much as they want the heads of the ones before me. I'm not clean of this either; I'll do anything to break the three people in front of me. I'm stuck in a rut at fourth, trying to surpass third but never letting Miss Jewels at number five pass ahead of me.

I'm the most revered female racer in the entire city. Not that it counts for much. We don't talk; socialize. Some of us have our cliques and groups to fall back on; Isabel Diaz at nine has created a mass gathering of friends and family to rely on and own the streets with. Joe Vega, current king of the hill, relies on being a lovable party animal and respected racer to keep people from being jealous enough to burn him. There's a crew of stragglers outside of the city led by a man dubbed Razor. I've crossed paths with him; he's a poseur and a pig and his two cronies are even worse. They'll cut any corners they possibly can to get ahead in the game. It's an unspoken rule that tactics like that help get you up the blacklist.

Myself, I'm on my own. I don't make friends, I don't fall in love. My family is a world away, and I haven't talked to them since I was eighteen. I used to miss them. They used to make me weak. Now they're just another memory, another burnt down bridge. I used to be Kira Nakazato, the loner freak and pyromaniac who didn't talk much but loved to cause destruction. Now I'm Kaze, number four on the blacklist, known for defying logic and risking her skin and her car to destroy all challengers. Not much has changed otherwise, though.

Not too long after I hit the 201, I see a sturdy roadblock ahead of me. There's an enticing open spot in the road, but I never take it, because there's a strip of tire-tearing spikes that will guarantee me at least a few years in a cell in the Camden Penitentiary. On the other side, there's a row of carefully arranged SUVs designed to stop me in my tracks like a brick wall. This is why I love my Mercedes. The CLK-500 is one of the biggest, meanest bastards you can get around here- built like a mack truck that, combined with its blinding speed, can break through anything like butter. All I have to do is gun it and press on the nitrous, and the SUV goes flying through the air like a soccer ball. As it falls back on the ground a few feet away, cleanly upside down, I feel a bit of purity return to my adrenaline. The ether turns into a luscious, honey-like energy and I feel powerful and purposeful again.

This is my purpose. It's unhealthy, it's illegal, it's fucked up and it's unnecessary, but it's all I'm programmed to do anymore, to cause chaos. If I don't do that there's nothing left. I'm not a person anymore. I'm a driver, a name. I'm a reputation, a character, an adversary. I'm a wanted poster, a million dollar bounty. I'm anything and everything except for a human being.

There's nothing I can do about it, but it's the fate I've made for myself, so I may as well live it up.

I grab one of the highway exits that veer towards Rosewood and the college up there, veering left as I notice the Pontiacs begin to back off and turn away. The sirens die down and I can hear the scanner again. All of the current officers are looking to back away. I'm not fooled, though, because I know that this is simply the calm before the storm.

I've barely finished going up Lyons Boulevard and onto the 99 in Rosewood when I hear the composed voice of the female dispatch coordinator. "Pursuit has escalated into condition five. I repeat, condition five."

Despite myself, I grin. Eight minutes in and already the biggest guns are coming out. I veer westbound on the 99, hearing the engine of the copter already as it trails me again. I've just barely reached the small tunnel less than a mile in before I see a series of white Corvettes coming out of the other side in droves. They're just as fast as me, but I'm bigger, stronger and overall better than all of them. Fifty-three pursuits made in my history. None of them lost. I haven't even used one of my get-out-free cards to buy out the cops. They sit in a small stack on the desk in my garage like unused poker chips.

The new squad tries to surround me, but I step on the nitrous before they can reach me, outrunning them. I notice a large semi in my path, and my breath catches in my throat. I swerve tightly to my left, avoiding the semi by a hair but skidding along the concrete railing. The sound of the paint screeching off of my Mercedes works like nails to a chalkboard, grabbing my attention and reminding me of the high stakes. Before the Corvettes can coordinate themselves to surround me, I've used the nitrous for an acceleration boost and maneuver around the alienated semi, which has braked and remained stagnant around the chaos.

I'm breathing heavily by the time the lanes merge and the highway stretches nearly a quarter mile wide. Past the tollbooths and Hollis I drive, keeping an eye out for Corvettes, SUVs and roadblocks. To throw them off, I break the gates that lead to Hickley Field, the College Football Stadium. There's no game today, so no parking. Luckily, keeping with its history of precariously built objects, there's one of my favorite pursuit breakers to use.

Before anyone can comprehend what's going on, I've blown through the metal pillar holding the giant neon sign up, which comes crashing down on top of half of my pursuers. I laugh, because every time I hit it, no one sees it coming and the crew at Rosewood College always put it back up again, in the same fashion. This is what I meant when I say that the people here, the normal, law abiding citizens, are so oblivious and therefore deserving of all the punishment they get.

The people drive around on the streets as if they don't expect any trouble and they're surprised when they've been yet again launched across the road and into a neighboring house, of which the owner _just fixed his goddamned fence again. _People continue to do shoddy construction work even after their buildings and their structures and signs and beams have fallen countless times. They rely on the police to stop things, but they're only slightly better. In my career, I've noticed that the police never adapt to my strategy, they just vary their own and I've been at this long enough to know each one. Perhaps that's why street racers own this town: natural selection. As damaged as I am, I know this city better than anyone in a station wagon or a car with sirens ever tries to.

Sometimes it's just too easy.

But what else am I to do?

After I burst through the other side of the stadium (knocking down that sign for good measure) I find ahead of me a familiar dreaded switchback. The helicopter remains, mad-dogging me from the rear view mirror, and a couple of Corvettes are gathering themselves behind me. My dear Mercedes has never been that great at turning, so I slow down and try not to crash along the sides. The Corvettes are faster than me, and they begin to pass me up. Another rule of street racing: never let the cops get ahead of you, especially if they're god-damn Corvettes.

Right when the switchback breaks and I can see the college, the cops stop, and I ram into the taillights. They begin to try and back up, but I push forward. I know if this keeps up, more will follow and pin me in; such has been the downfall of many famous racers like Mia Townsend, a promising new racer who was busted by a rolling roadblock just before she could hit the blacklist. It's a damned shame, because lord knows we could use more female racers around here.

I'm not about to become another casualty, however.

I turn just slightly to the right, weaseling my way between the two cars. The cops wise up to my strategy and go to speed up, but that just makes my PIT maneuver work better. The cop on the left, I clip and shove against the wall, crunching it just so before I am on the run again. I hear the helicopter pilot over the transmitter from my dashboard casually explaining that they're running out of fuel and they'll have to bail on this one to refuel. That pilot always sounds like he's drawing too much amusement out of these chases.

I veer onto College Circle; always a easy place to reach high speeds with mile turns, albeit an open space for the cops to gang up on you. I calm myself down a bit, although my method is by hitting speeds in the mid-hundreds and blasting through a couple of roadblocks. When I see a couple of SUV Rhinos looking to turn me into a crushed can against a wall, I veer left into a nearby nature reserve. The cops easily dislike this place, and it's a good place to lose them- that is, if you don't crash into an uncompromising tree. After all, mother nature doesn't give a fuck about what happens to racers. No god can save us. It's just a matter of dragging as many people down with us as we possibly can.

I'm careful as I turn through the walking trails of the reserve, paralleling enough empty grass to make room for several cars and a bunch of chaos. I've amassed a following of at least fifteen Corvettes and even a couple of stray SUVs, and there's not many easy ways to get rid of them except to hope they're worse drivers than I am. At the very least, I get a dash of salvation by knocking over some gas cans on the edge of a small cabin. A fire lights and cops abandon their cars, and I get another hundred-thousand added to my wanted bounty.

When I see the road, I lunge for it. It's narrow as it winds past the country club (a place I avoid like the plague as far as pursuits go, since it's too easy to get yourself cornered in a sand bunker) and under the 99 Loop. A few roadblocks are sliced through as if they were never there- always go for the tail end of the car, after all. On the other side of the highway is one of the strongest methods of ending a pursuit there is- gas stations. Without a doubt in my head, I drive directly through the pumps, and the place explodes the moment I'm out of reach, almost taking me with it. The whole station falls apart and onto the drivers, whichever ones haven't abandoned firelit cars or, worse yet, lay dead in them. That's easily half a million worth of bounty right there.

I lose almost the entire squad except for two stragglers, and I'm certain I've had enough. More downhill switchbacks await me, and I have no qualms about knocking them out through the turns if I can. Soon, all of them are gone- crashed or scared- and if I'm not fast enough they'll be easily replaced with more mindless drones. The adrenaline begins to drain out and I find myself intensely exhausted. It's a dangerous exhaustion, almost a depression- as I cautiously drive through the narrow streets of Dunwich Hills. Everything feels finite, useless, purposeless. I don't feel guilt but I feel worthless, which couldn't be closer to the truth to be honest. I trace down the path I've taken in life and all the places I've gone wrong. It's almost a routine by now but one of these days it'll get me killed- by accident or intent.

I'm almost asleep by the time I pull into my safe house in Dunwich, my high gone and the crash beginning. Thankfully no one has followed and I'm able to press the button on my key ring that opens the garage door. I slow down and park myself in it before I press the button again, feeling the chill, lonely air of this empty warehouse of a garage, and the excited, uneasing turn in my gut as I realize I've escaped again, that no one knows I'm here, that I could hide in here forever and no one would find me. I never knew cowardice could be exhilarating but apparently it can.

Eventually, though, I throw my keys onto a cold, metal desk with papers strewn all over it. The pile of get-out-of-jail free cards amassed along my trip to slot four sit tight on my desk, their only use to be something to twirl between my fingers to help me think. Maps and pink slips and newspapers all line the desk for various reasons. I've headlined a couple. The cops know my alias, after all. They haven't touched the legend I've created for myself in the street racing world, the nonexistent intent behind my criminal activity, the sparse yet overwhelming emotion that clouds my heart, or that once upon a time I was Kira Nakazato.

I don't eye them for long. As I sit on a metal stool in front of my desk, I open a drawer and pull out an unused silver gun. It looks nice but I have no idea what type it is. All I know is the deadly equation that a bullet and a skull makes.

Carelessly yet thoughtfully, I look it over. Run it between my hands. I run a finger gently along the trigger and consider it. Then I put it back.

I'm not done yet. Sometimes I'd love to be, but I'm not.

I'm aware of how lonely I am but I haven't cried in eight years. I haven't felt weak for what seems like ages. I'm nowhere near fulfilled and happy, though. I'm just as much of a drone as the next street racer. I'll come and go.

I promise myself that I'll never be defeated, though.

I don't have anywhere to sleep so I get back into my car, in the driver's seat, and shut the door. I look at myself in the rear view mirror. I'm twenty-seven years old, I think. I honestly can't remember. I look exhausted. My features are sharp, and I look attractive, I suppose, although I haven't touched another human's skin for the longest time. My own skin feels cold and metallic to the touch. I recline the seat as far back as I can and turn off the police transmitter. It's only three thirty but I'm too tired to consider doing anything else. My beloved Mercedes, the only friend I have, is alone with me in the garage. It's where I sleep for the night.

At night I dream of the day I hit the top of the blacklist. It will come someday. I dream of finishing the last race. Joe Vega won't be second place for long, but he will have that moment. I never take pink slips. I'm perfectly fine with my Mercedes. The day I win, I'll invoke the wrath of every single cop in town. All of them will chase me. It will be glorious. Buildings will fall and blood will spill. I'll take as many of them out as I can, and whoever I can't get will watch me as I drive off of the bridge and into the river, undefeated and uncaught.

They don't call me Kamikaze for nothing.


End file.
